published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Music / Master / Master of Philosophy

Cross – cultural composition has been defined as the creation of a cultural synthesis of the old and new, traditional and foreign into philosophical, artistic, stylistic and aesthetic product that communicates to various audiences. The study adopted a mode of creativity / dynamic approach through the synthesis of traditional Samia marriage music and Western compositional techniques and approaches. To ground the study in the rich cultural traditions of the Samia people of Funyula Division in Western Province of Kenya, an anthropological documentation formed an important part of the study. The study adopted Absolute Formalism theory by Reimer (1989) based on component relationships in which different parts like harmony, melody, and text rhythm relate to one another to create unity. The study also incorporated Aesthetic Functionalism theory by Akuno (1997) on social functions in which; the contextual meaning of the composition was based. The study used the Accommodation theory on Convergence, Giles and Smith (Giles & St Clair, 1979) to unify the analogous aspects in the two stated theories. In the study, descriptive and creative designs were used to cater for the music and social context. In the descriptive phase, Samia marriage folk songs were collected from traditional performers, who were also, interviewed using a questionnaire. Purposeful and snowball sampling techniques were used to select twenty folk songs. They were recorded, transcribed and analysed for dominant traditional musical features and compositional promise. In the creative phase, lyrics were identified and reorganised, the prevalent features isolated and used. The result was a compositional inspiration on which the Marriage Suite was based. The ultimate product of the study was an artistic model framework that could guide the creation of art music using Kenyan traditional music idioms; accomplished through the Marriage Suite. To safeguard contextual and music fidelity, member checking was consistently maintained during data collection and creative phase. Rhythmic and melodic accuracy of the transcribed songs was ascertained by play backs using FINALE music notation. Social identity in the composition was taken into account through use of Samia music characteristics that included intervals, solo-responsorial aspects, overlapping entries, parallelism and common rhythmic patterns. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / D. Litt et Phil. (Musicology)

Luís da Câmara Cascudo publicou uma vasta obra centrada no homem brasileiro visto pela ótica da etnografia, do folclore e da história. Muito se tem escrito e estudado sobre seu legado. Embora não tenha escrito nenhum livro tratando especificamente sobre música, verifica-se em seus escritos uma grande preocupação pelo assunto e constantes menções, estudos e comentários. Detalhes de sua biografia indicam como a música estava presente em sua vida e, principalmente, o quanto se dedicou ao estímulo aos musicistas de sua terra e à ajuda e incentivo às instituições musicais da cidade de Natal. A atividade de Câmara Cascudo como musicólogo é praticamente desconhecida, pois este aspecto de sua vida ainda não havia sido devidamente estudado. O propósito deste trabalho é trazer um pouco de luz sobre o assunto. / Luís da Câmara Cascudo published a vast amount of work focused on the Brazilian man as seen from the optics of ethnography, folklore and history, and much has been written and studied on his enormous legacy. Although he has not written any book dealing specifically with music his concern on the subject is clear from his writings, as can be noticed on frequent references, studies and comments. Details of his biography show how music was present in his life and, particularly, how and how much he devoted himself both to encouraging musicians and to support musical institutions from his home land. All of Câmara Cascudos activities as a musicologist is in fact unknown for certainly this aspect of his life has not been properly acknowledged in the specialized literature. The purpose of this paper is to shed some light on this subject.

Firstly, while the Yao people inhabit in wide geographic regions stretching across Southern China and South East Asia, even overseas, the Paiyao, a branch of the Yao who inhabits only in the Liannan district of the Guangdong province, is unique not only in their geographical inhabitancy but also cultural characteristics. / Secondly, while Yao people's Getang ritual is a wide spread ritual practice with local variations, there has not been any in-depth study on the Getang ritual of the Paiyao people. / The significance of this study are Three-fold. / The thesis aims to study the soundscape of Paiyao ethnic nationality's "Getang Ritual" in Guangdong Province. / Thirdly, with a musicological concern, this thesis approaches its subject from the perspective of "soundscape of the ritual enactment", (Tsao Penyeh 2006: 81) and aspires to reach an understanding of the wider meaning of the Getang ritual among the Paiyao people and their society. / This study consists of the following three processes: (1) Fieldwork to investigate and compile ethnographic texts from both the researcher's observation and insiders' oral narrations and relating to actions in the makings of the ritual soundscape. (2) Analysis of the ritual "sounds", in terms of themselves and their extra-musical factors. (3) Interpretation of the meaning of ritual sounds and their soundscape of Paiyao's Getang ritual within the framework of the belief system that consists of a trinity of sounds and soundscape, ritual enactment and belief. / This thesis has seven chapters, with its theoretical and methodological reverences indebted to ritual studies by Tsao Penyeh (his research of ritual and ritual soundscape of China's belief systems) and Clifford Geertz (his many writings on anthropological theory and methodology, as well as his study of "reinterpretation to other's interpretation"). / 周凱模. / Adviser: Pen-Yeh (Poon-Yee) Tsao. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 69-08, Section: A, page: 2945. / Thesis (doctoral)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 289-317) and indexes. / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / School code: 1307. / Zhou Kaimo.

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In recent years there has been an increasing interest in the study of African popular arts and performance genres. In this study, I will focus on isicathamiya, a South African musical performance genre, and in particular the attempt of its practitioners to create new identities and a new sense of self through their own interpretation of the genre. This study will concentrate on the 'isicathamiya youth' in the semi-rural community of Emkhambathini (located about 30 kilometres east of Pietermaritzburg) and their strategies of self-definition in the New South Africa. Isicathamiya has strong roots in migrant labour and this has been the main focal point around which many researchers have concentrated. However, recent years have seen a movement of isicathamiya concentrated within rural and semi-rural communities such as Emkhambathini. The performers in these areas have a unique interpretation of the genre and use it to communicate their thoughts and identities to a diverse audience made up of young and old. In this study I will be looking at the 'isicathamiya youth' within three broad categories, the re-invention of tradition, the re-interpretation of the genre, and issues of masculinities. Each of these categories accounts for the three chapters within this study and serves to give a broad yet in-depth study of the 'new wave' of isicathamiya performers. The first chapter, entitled 'Traditional Re-invention', will deal with issues relating to the project of traditional 'redefinition' which the 'isicathamiya youth' are pursuing in Emkhambathini. I will show that tradition is not a stagnant concept, but is in fact ever-changing over time and place, a concept that does not carry one definition over an entire community. Through various song texts and frames of analysis I will attempt fto show how tradition is being used to further the construction of positive identities within Emkhambathini and give youth a place in Zulu tradition and in a multi-layered modernity. The second chapter will deal with how the 'isicathamiya youth' raise and stretch the boundaries of the genre in relation to a number of concepts. These concepts include topics of performance, women and popular memory and serve to give a broader view as to what the 'isicathamiya youth' are trying to achieve, namely a new positive self identity that seeks to empower the youth in the New South Africa. The last chapter will look at issues of masculinity and how the youth use different strategies to regain the masculine identities of their fathers and grandfathers and maintain patriarchal authority. Issues looked at within this chapter will include men's role within society and their perceptions of women. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2005.

In 1995, fiddler Ashley MacIsaac released the album Hi, How Are You Today? that featured MacIsaac performing traditional Celtic tunes accompanied by modern rock instruments. The musical genre transformation on the album (notable because people who were not fans of Celtic music bought this album, tracks were released for airplay, and music videos accompanied the singles) can be studied according to the types of genre transformation outlined by Alastair Fowler in Kinds of Literature. If MacIsaac's goal was to offer a popular rock album while playing traditional tunes on the fiddle, critics and members of his audience inevitably questioned his motivation, from which charges of pandering and exploitation followed. Alternate interpretations stressed that MacIsaac was merely adapting traditional music to reflect a changing musical climate. This thesis examines such perspectives, along with the global phenomenon of modernizing folk music amidst the ambiguous boundary between popular and folk musical genres.

This dissertation provides both an historical outline and contemporary ethnographic account of the Panamanian musical practice called “música típica popular,” which is commonly understood in Panama to denote a specific kind of vernacular music that is widely embraced. By examining the social-historical processes, events and discourses that have contributed to the genre’s development, this study seeks to develop greater understanding of what I argue is this music’s particular and pronouncedly ambiguous relationship to prominent themes of Panamanian cultural nationalism. Specifically, I endeavour to show that early on in its history música típica popular epitomized Panama’s (liberalist-identified) national ethos of progressive modernity and cultural cosmopolitanism while at the same time maintaining alignments to specific territories and musical practices significant to Panamanian vernacular imaginaries. The historical outline covers música típica popular’s development beginning from the late nineteenth century to the present. Its focus is on the genre’s tandem commercialisation and massification, performance and production technologies and associated performance modalities, shared musical/sonic traits, repertoire and approaches to innovation through musical mixing or fusión (fusion). One of the central goals here is to trace and examine points of alignment between música típica popular and dominant paradigms governing isthmian geo-cultural self-identification—particularly the interplay between a rural-identified “vernacular” culture and the perceived urban cosmopolitanism of Panamanian metropolites. Through ethnographic research this study also aims to examine the various sonic, social and economic factors that contribute to notions of música típica popular as a particular socio-musical collectivity actively in dialogue with discourses of Panamanian national and cultural identity. To this end, notions of “genre” and “style” provide an analytical framework particularly for coming to terms with the interplay between sensibilities of convention and common practice, and a need for meaningful differentiation among practitioners. It is my contention that while música típica popular practitioners actively cultivate links both to themes of Panamanian music-cultural vernacularism and cosmopolitanism, on the whole the relationship of the genre to nationalist discourse should be more properly understood as one of sustained ambiguity: not wholly aligned to one theme or the other, and in fact doggedly and often productively resistant to such binary categorizations.

This dissertation provides both an historical outline and contemporary ethnographic account of the Panamanian musical practice called “música típica popular,” which is commonly understood in Panama to denote a specific kind of vernacular music that is widely embraced. By examining the social-historical processes, events and discourses that have contributed to the genre’s development, this study seeks to develop greater understanding of what I argue is this music’s particular and pronouncedly ambiguous relationship to prominent themes of Panamanian cultural nationalism. Specifically, I endeavour to show that early on in its history música típica popular epitomized Panama’s (liberalist-identified) national ethos of progressive modernity and cultural cosmopolitanism while at the same time maintaining alignments to specific territories and musical practices significant to Panamanian vernacular imaginaries. The historical outline covers música típica popular’s development beginning from the late nineteenth century to the present. Its focus is on the genre’s tandem commercialisation and massification, performance and production technologies and associated performance modalities, shared musical/sonic traits, repertoire and approaches to innovation through musical mixing or fusión (fusion). One of the central goals here is to trace and examine points of alignment between música típica popular and dominant paradigms governing isthmian geo-cultural self-identification—particularly the interplay between a rural-identified “vernacular” culture and the perceived urban cosmopolitanism of Panamanian metropolites. Through ethnographic research this study also aims to examine the various sonic, social and economic factors that contribute to notions of música típica popular as a particular socio-musical collectivity actively in dialogue with discourses of Panamanian national and cultural identity. To this end, notions of “genre” and “style” provide an analytical framework particularly for coming to terms with the interplay between sensibilities of convention and common practice, and a need for meaningful differentiation among practitioners. It is my contention that while música típica popular practitioners actively cultivate links both to themes of Panamanian music-cultural vernacularism and cosmopolitanism, on the whole the relationship of the genre to nationalist discourse should be more properly understood as one of sustained ambiguity: not wholly aligned to one theme or the other, and in fact doggedly and often productively resistant to such binary categorizations.

Luís da Câmara Cascudo publicou uma vasta obra centrada no homem brasileiro visto pela ótica da etnografia, do folclore e da história. Muito se tem escrito e estudado sobre seu legado. Embora não tenha escrito nenhum livro tratando especificamente sobre música, verifica-se em seus escritos uma grande preocupação pelo assunto e constantes menções, estudos e comentários. Detalhes de sua biografia indicam como a música estava presente em sua vida e, principalmente, o quanto se dedicou ao estímulo aos musicistas de sua terra e à ajuda e incentivo às instituições musicais da cidade de Natal. A atividade de Câmara Cascudo como musicólogo é praticamente desconhecida, pois este aspecto de sua vida ainda não havia sido devidamente estudado. O propósito deste trabalho é trazer um pouco de luz sobre o assunto. / Luís da Câmara Cascudo published a vast amount of work focused on the Brazilian man as seen from the optics of ethnography, folklore and history, and much has been written and studied on his enormous legacy. Although he has not written any book dealing specifically with music his concern on the subject is clear from his writings, as can be noticed on frequent references, studies and comments. Details of his biography show how music was present in his life and, particularly, how and how much he devoted himself both to encouraging musicians and to support musical institutions from his home land. All of Câmara Cascudos activities as a musicologist is in fact unknown for certainly this aspect of his life has not been properly acknowledged in the specialized literature. The purpose of this paper is to shed some light on this subject.